System and method for creating and managing geofeeds

• US 9,479,557 B2
• Filed: 07/06/2015
• Issued: 10/25/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 03/07/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Tai Technologies Inc. (Crisis24)
• Original Assignee: Geofeedia, Inc.
• Inventors: Harris, Philip B., Mitchell, Scott K., Mulroy, Michael J.
• Primary Examiner(s): JEAN GILLES, JUDE
• Application Number:
  US14/792,538
• Publication Number:
  US 20160006783A1
• Time in Patent Office: 477 Days
• Field of Search: 709/217, 709/206, 709/204, 709/207, 709/218
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/487 using geographical or spatial information, e.g. location
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/75 Media network packet handling
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/52 specially adapted for the location of the user terminal

Abstract

The disclosure relates to systems and methods of burning, snapshotting, streaming and curating geofeeds, each geofeed including a plurality of geofeed content items that are aggregated from a plurality of content providers using respective requests formatted specifically for individual ones of the plurality of content providers, where each individual set of a plurality of content is relevant to one or more geographically definable locations. Archives of a geofeed may be generated by burning portions or all of the geofeed content items and/or generating snapshots of geofeeds at different times. A real-time geofeed may be streamed by continuously or periodically obtaining newly available geofeed content items and updated a geofeed stream in real-time. Collections of geofeed content items may be curated in order to organize and follow geofeed content items of interest.

Claims

1. A system for generating social media snapshots in a timeline, the system comprising:

a computer system comprising one or more physical processors programmed with one or more computer program instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, program the computer system to;

obtain, from one or more social media content providers, a first plurality of social media content items that are relevant to one or more geographically definable locations and are relevant to a first time;

obtain, from the one or more social media content providers, a second plurality of social media content items that are relevant to the one or more geographically definable locations and are relevant to a second time different than the first time;

store, in a database accessible to the computer system, the first plurality of social media content items in association with the first time;

store, in the database, the second plurality of social media content items in association with the second time;

generate a first snapshot of social media in a timeline based on the first plurality of social media content items and a second snapshot of social media in the timeline based on the second plurality of social media content items, wherein the first snapshot in the timeline is based on the first time and the second snapshot in the timeline is based on the second time; and

cause the first snapshot and the second snapshot in the timeline to be communicated via a network.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the computer system is further programmed to:

receive a request to generate social media snapshots relevant to the one or more geographically definable locations.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the computer system is further programmed to:

store the first social media snapshot and second social media snapshot in association with the one or more geographically definable locations, wherein the first social media snapshot is stored in association with the first time and the second social media snapshot is stored in association with the second time.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein to generate the social media snapshots, the computer system is further programmed to:

determine whether one or more social media snapshots for which the social media snapshots are requested already exist;

obtain a geofeed definition responsive to a determination that one or more snapshots for which the social media snapshots are requested already exist, wherein the geofeed definition includes a specification of the one or more geographically definable locations associated with the request;

obtain a plurality of social media content items from the one or more social media content providers based on the geofeed definition and requests formatted specifically for individual ones of the one or more social media content providers; and

update the one or more social media snapshots for which the social media snapshots are requested with the plurality of social media content items.

5. The system of claim 2, wherein the computer system is further programmed to:

determine whether the request to generate social media snapshots includes one or more geographically definable locations; and

return an error message responsive to a determination that the request to generate social media snapshots does not include at least one geographically definable location.

6. The system of claim 3, wherein the computer system is further programmed to:

determine a current date and time associated with the request to generate social media snapshots; and

store the first social media snapshot and second social media snapshot in association with the one or more geographically definable locations, wherein the first social media snapshot and second social media snapshot are also stored in association with the current date and time.

7. The system of claim 3, wherein the computer system is further programmed to:

obtain one or more social media snapshot parameters that specify social media content items to include when the plurality of social media content items are obtained; and

store the social media snapshots based on the social media snapshot parameters.

8. The system of claim 2, wherein the request to generate social media snapshots originates from a user or an automated process.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the first time and the second time are separated by a predefined interval of time, wherein the computer system is further programmed to:

obtain, from the one or more social media content providers, a third plurality of social media content items that are relevant to the one or more geographically definable locations and are relevant to a third time that is after the second time by an amount of time specified by the predefined interval;

store, in the database, the third plurality of social media content items in association with the third time;

generate a third snapshot of social media in the timeline based on the third plurality of social media content items, wherein the third snapshot in the timeline is based on the third time.

19. The system of claim 1, wherein the first plurality of social media content items and the second plurality of social media content items were posted and/or created at the one or more geographically definable locations.

20. The system of claim 1, wherein the first time comprises a first time interval and the second time comprises a second time interval different than the first time interval.

21. The system of claim 4, wherein the geofeed definition comprises one or more geofeed parameters, and wherein the one or more geofeed parameters comprise at least a first parameter that specifies the one or more geographically definable locations.

22. The system of claim 21, wherein the one or more geofeed parameters comprise at least a second parameter that specifies whether to filter in or out a social media content item other than based on the one or more geographically definable locations, wherein the plurality of social media content items are filtered in or out based on the second parameter.

10. A method for generating social media snapshots in a timeline, the method being implemented by a computer system having one or more physical processors programmed with one or more computer program instructions that, when executed by the one or more physical processors, program the computer system to perform the method, the method comprising:

obtaining, by the computer system, from one or more social media content providers, a first plurality of social media content items that are relevant to one or more geographically definable locations and are relevant to a first time;

obtaining, by the computer system, from the one or more social media content providers, a second plurality of social media content items that are relevant to the one or more geographically definable locations and are relevant to a second time different than the first time;

storing, by the computer system, in a database accessible to the computer system, the first plurality of social media content items in association with the first time;

storing, by the computer system, in the database, the second plurality of social media content items in association with the second time;

generating, by the computer system, a first snapshot of social media in a timeline based on the first plurality of social media content items and a second snapshot of social media in the timeline based on the second plurality of social media content items, wherein the first snapshot in the timeline is based on the first time and the second snapshot in the timeline is based on the second time; and

causing, by the computer system, the first snapshot and the second snapshot in the timeline to be communicated via a network.

11. The method of claim 10, the method further comprising:

receiving, by the computer system, a request to generate social media snapshots relevant to the one or more geographically definable locations.

12. The method of claim 11, the method further comprising:

storing, by the computer system, the first social media snapshot and second social media snapshot in association with the one or more geographically definable locations, wherein the first social media snapshot is stored in association with the first time and the second social media snapshot is stored in association with the second time.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein generating the social media snapshots comprises:

determining, by the computer system, whether one or more social media snapshots for which the social media snapshots are requested already exist;

obtaining, by the computer system, a geofeed definition responsive to a determination that one or more snapshots for which the social media snapshots are requested already exist, wherein the geofeed definition includes a specification of the one or more geographically definable locations associated with the request;

obtaining, by the computer system, a plurality of social media content items from the one or more social media content providers based on the geofeed definition and requests formatted specifically for individual ones of the one or more social media content providers; and

updating, by the computer system, the one or more social media snapshots for which the social media snapshots are requested with the plurality of social media content items.

14. The method of claim 11, the method further comprising:

determining, by the computer system, whether the request to generate social media snapshots includes one or more geographically definable locations; and

returning, by the computer system, an error message responsive to a determination that the request to generate social media snapshots does not include at least one geographically definable location.

15. The method of claim 12, the method further comprising:

determining, by the computer system, a current date and time associated with the request to generate social media snapshots; and

storing, by the computer system, the first social media snapshot and second social media snapshot in association with the one or more geographically definable locations, wherein the first social media snapshot and second social media snapshot are also stored in association with the current date and time.

16. The method of claim 12, the method further comprising:

obtaining, by the computer system, one or more social media snapshot parameters that specify social media content items to include when the plurality of social media content items are obtained; and

storing, by the computer system, the social media snapshots based on the social media snapshot parameters.

17. The method of claim 11, wherein the request to generate social media snapshots originates from a user or an automated process.

18. The method of claim 10, wherein the first time and the second time are separated by a predefined interval of time, the method further comprising:

obtaining, by the computer system, from the one or more social media content providers, a third plurality of social media content items that are relevant to the one or more geographically definable locations and are relevant to a third time that is after the second time by an amount of time specified by the predefined interval;

storing, by the computer system, in the database, the third plurality of social media content items in association with the third time;

generating, by the computer system, a third snapshot of social media in the timeline based on the third plurality of social media content items, wherein the third snapshot in the timeline is based on the third time.

23. The method of claim 10, wherein the first plurality of social media content items and the second plurality of social media content items were posted and/or created at the one or more geographically definable locations.

24. The method of claim 10, wherein the first time comprises a first time interval and the second time comprises a second time interval different than the first time interval.

25. The method of claim 13, wherein the geofeed definition comprises one or more geofeed parameters, and wherein the one or more geofeed parameters comprise at least a first parameter that specifies the one or more geographically definable locations.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein the one or more geofeed parameters comprise at least a second parameter that specifies whether to filter in or out a social media content item other than based on the one or more geographically definable locations, wherein the plurality of social media content items are filtered in or out based on the second parameter.